


Mahler's Fourth

by heartsfilthylesson



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-19
Updated: 2014-07-19
Packaged: 2018-02-09 14:12:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1985952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartsfilthylesson/pseuds/heartsfilthylesson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In Paris, nothing beats rare meat and blood red wine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mahler's Fourth

**Author's Note:**

> Bringing this from my Tumblr because I love this ship.

White gold is cold on her ring finger, diamonds heavy in her small hands. Absurd, she thinks, and a bitter laugh gathers in her chest, threatens to spill and ruin their little act. She wonders what her mother would think of her pretend marriage to a murderer. Mrs. Du Maurier would likely accept it –anything to see her only daughter wed.

“Isobel?” Hannibal presses down his fingers on her wrist and she remembers that she’s now Isobel, remembers to smile at the overly zealous real estate agent.

“It’s beautiful,” she says politely and leaves Hannibal’s side to browse the large, though sparsely furnished, sitting room.

The house, though renovated, feels very old. Bedelia supposes that’s the very thing that draws Hannibal –Joachim , she corrects herself—to it, she supposes that’s the very thing that appeals to her as well. The floor to ceiling windows feel decadent and familiar, the ones at home –what used to be home—felt more like prison bars than thick glass.

The woman showing them the property—Andrea, perhaps— ushers them to the slightly overgrown garden. “Do you have any children?” she inquires politely in French, pointing to an old tree swing and makes a comment Bedelia does not catch.

She opens her mouth to speak but Hannibal answers before she has the chance. “No,” he says resolutely, stealing from her the chance of imaginary children left in the care of fussing imaginary grandparents in Rhode Island or somewhere equally inane. She wouldn’t have dared anyway.

Bedelia looks away as if offended. Andrea looks flustered but recovers with admirable speed, requesting they walk further into the garden to admire the property from a new angle. The heels of her taupe Brian Atwoods sink into the damp grass and wet soil and she feels a bit ridiculous, impossibly short even in towering shoes.

Hannibal gives her a questioning look when she retreats into the safety of the veranda. “My shoes,” Bedelia tells him in English and he tilts his head in what she assumes is understanding. They drift away from her and toward the tree swing, Hannibal’s hand on Andrea’s elbow. It’s not her intent but she catches some of their conversation – it seems perfectly innocuous but there’s a distinct interest in the woman’s voice. She’s very attractive, Bedelia realises belatedly, with dark brown hair and brown eyes, slender and tall (so much taller than her) in a pair of sensible shoes.

A strange feeling gathers in the pit of Bedelia’s stomach, it settles in the back of her throat but she refuses to catalogue it. Instead, she shelves it in the furthest part of her mind where it’ll be forgotten and left to gather dust. They’re no longer doctor and patient, they’re no longer colleagues and they’ve never been friends. They’re nothing but if she were any other woman, she’d be jealous. She’s not any other woman.

They write their new names on the bottom of a paper and, for an obscene amount of money, the countryside house is theirs for two months.

It takes them less than two days to fully settle and before a week has passed, their life has become routine. Hannibal leaves for many hours at a time and she sits alone in the quiet of the sitting room or the study to read. She thinks he must really trust her not to run but remembers he knows she has nowhere left to go.

She hears footsteps in the hall but doesn’t look away from the paper in her hands. Hannibal refills her glass of Riesling; she pretends not to notice and feels oddly juvenile – bare feet and legs folded beneath her, ignoring the boy sitting across from her.

Hannibal watches her and his intensity unnerves her, distracts her from statistics on paediatric schizophrenia until she takes off her reading glasses and puts the journal down.

“Hannibal?” It’s neither a question nor a statement: it’s the sigh a less polite woman would have let out.

“May we have dinner?” he inquires as if they’ve not had dinner together every day for nearly a month.

It’s so ridiculous she almost laughs. It’s so ridiculous she says yes.

Dinner is almost as quiet as the drive into Paris. He compliments his braised lamb but her duck breast is left mostly untouched. She’s on her second glass of Pinot Noir before he’s drained his first and thinks they must look like a couple on the edge of divorce. The wine is as red as her lips.

Hannibal drapes an arm around her and suggests they take a walk. They’ve not taken two steps before he tightens his grip on her waist, as if she’ll float away on sheer will if he’s not there to tether her. It was ultimately her decision to go away with him but with the passing of days and the weight of isolation she’s felt her resolve falter. Perhaps he could feel the hesitation thrumming in her bloodstream or smell the faintest hint of regret blended with the bergamot of her perfume.

When they arrive, they linger in the sitting room for awhile, an uncomfortable silence stretching between them even as Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 plays in the background. She’s poised for retreat until morning but Hannibal speaks. He thanks her for the evening and looks at her in a way he’d never done before. She doesn’t have time to think of what to say (other than you’re welcome which sounds inexplicably dense in her head) before he approaches her. Bedelia almost takes a step back but remembers an ankle giving out in an office a lifetime ago. She’s so still she might spontaneously become marble.

“Bedelia,” he’s inches away and gives her a questioning look. She nods her consent and is pressed against a wall before she can reconsider.

He plants small kisses on the underside of her jaw and the hollow of her throat, tracing her collarbone with his fingertips. She slips her hands beneath his white dress shirt and sighs into his mouth when it finally finds hers, wholly unsurprised at her body’s response to him.

There’s only the taste of wine when he kisses her and she presses her tongue on the roof of his mouth wanting to taste him instead. He growls and breaks the kiss to help her out of her dress.

She presses her body against his and thinks she must be crazy. Hannibal chases the thought away with a firm hand inside her underwear.

Her fingernails are leaving marks on the back of her neck and he suggests they use his bedroom.


End file.
